The United Auto Workers on Monday filed for a workplace organizing vote at a Nissan Plant in Jackson, Miss., in another bid to get a foothold in the union-averse South.
The union has been working for years to build support at the plant, and Monday’s petition is a sign that union leaders think they have sufficient backing to risk a vote.
Nissan spokeswoman Parul Bajaj said the company was not supporting the union’s bid. “While it is ultimately up to our employees who will represent them, we do not believe that UAW representation is in the best interest of Nissan Canton and its workers,” Bajaj told the Associated Press.
UAW has not commented, but it is planning an event near the factory on Tuesday to formally announce its bid. The factory has an estimated 6,500 workers. The union has leveraged support from local civil rights groups such as the NAACP to boost its bid.
Under federal law, a union must obtain signed cards from at least 30 percent of workplace’s employees before it can petition the National Labor Relations Board, the main labor law enforcement agency, to order an election. Unions typically wait until they have cards from at least half of the workers before they file a petition to boost their chances.
Mississippi, like all Southern states, has a right-to-work law, which prohibits union contracts with management that force all workers to join the union or at least pay it a regular fee as a condition of employment. Such provisions, dubbed “security clauses” by unions, are regular features on union contracts in non-right-to-work states. So, even if the UAW did win a workplace vote at the Nissan plant, it would not be able to legally require all the workers to support the union.
Right-to-work laws are widely seen as a key reason why labor unions are weaker in the South and why foreign companies often build factories there.
UAW has struggled to organize Southern auto plants. In 2013, it lost a high-profile bid to represent all workers at a Chattanooga, Tenn., Volkswagen plant when they voted 712-626 against collective bargaining. The union later won a vote for a micro-union of just 160 workers there. Volkswagen has not recognized the union.
